


things can't go back to the way they used to be (you're better off without me)

by ezlybored



Category: Korean Drama, 너를 기억해 | Hello Monster
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Minor Character Death, i cant actually write mystery stories but iM TRYING MY BEST
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-10-05
Packaged: 2018-04-15 09:24:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4601550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ezlybored/pseuds/ezlybored
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the blink of an eye, Lee Min lost both his father and his hyung. Twenty years later, he found his hyung again. An AU where Lee Joon-young took Hyun instead of Min, or, alternatively, the story of how I accidentally made myself sad.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. moved on, but you moved with me

**Author's Note:**

> so basically i started thinking about what would happen if joon-young had taken hyun instead of min and now there's... this. 
> 
> i'm not really sure what i'm doing so just bear with me, i'll sort this mess out eventually.

Lee Min lost his father and his hyung in the same day. His father was lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood, stabbed with a kitchen knife. But his hyung just disappeared, there one day and gone the next, without a single trace left behind. From then on he maintained the hope that his hyung might still be alive, hoping desperately even as years went by. Once that fateful day had come and passed, things were never the same for Min.

It wasn’t exactly a leap of logic to conclude who was responsible. From Hyun, he’d heard of Lee Joon-young in passing. Besides, it was just a bit too much of a coincidence for Lee Joon-young to escape from prison on the same day the man who’d caught him died and his son was kidnapped. In fact, Joon-young might have orchestrated the escape just for that purpose.

A police officer who had worked alongside his father took him in and raised him to the best of her ability, but of course Min could never forget or let go of what had happened. His hyung had been his whole world, and with him gone Min was just lost, confused and dazed in an unfamiliar, unwelcoming place without anyone to guide him. Finding his hyung became the focus of his life; as a child, he of course did not have the ability to look, but when he grew he fully intended to do all he could, no matter how many years it might have been. Hyun _had_ to be alive. The rational adult part of his mind told him the chances were extremely low. The child inside him that yearned for his hyung told him that Hyun was out there, somewhere, and Min just had to find him.

But where to look? How to look? How could he find out the answer to those questions? How could he find Hyun when he could be anywhere in the world, could be dead even? (Only Min stubbornly refused to consider that possibility.) A child did not have the resources to search, and though Officer Hyun assured him they were searching for Hyun, he knew well enough the chances of finding his hyung were slim. Even as he grew into an adult, he was no closer to having the abilities to look for his hyung. If anything, the passing of time made it harder for him to dig up any clues.

So Min, conflicted by the fact that he needed to do what he could not do, ran. In Korea, he was plagued by thoughts of his hyung and all the what-ifs, the endless possibilities. In America, it was not much better, but at least he could lose himself in a crowd where he knew no one and no one knew him. His name was Daniel, not Min, so he wouldn't hear the echoes of hyung's voice, _Min-ah,_ ringing in his ears. He could lose himself in his studies, try and clear his mind of the desperate need to know if Hyun was dead or alive for the intricacies of the law. If he concentrated enough, he could fight off the need to have closure, instead of the endless hell of hoping against reason and logic, terrified of having his hopes crushed but spurred on by the tiniest chance that what he hoped for was not fantasy, but reality. Anything was better than that.

In the end, he came back to Korea, never quite able to settle and find peace in America or whatever he was looking for in the first place. Not that Korea was any better; there was a reason he'd left, after all, but in America he felt like he lost his sense of self until he feared he might be swept away. Some form of stability and familiarity returned to him when he returned, and his memories of his hyung had dulled over time so he was not as crippled by the combination of the need to look for Hyun and the knowledge it was near impossible, if not simply impossible to find him. That was both a blessing and a curse, an endless conflict like his life had seemed to become after that day. Relief and guilt, fear and freedom, battled with each other inside him. They coalesced into a shaky, delicate balance that let him stay in Korea without feeling like he would split apart from the mess inside him.

Min became a prosecutor, though he wasn't sure why. Maybe he was hoping to find justice for others if he could not find justice for his father or his hyung. Maybe that was just wishful thinking and he just did it because he didn't know what else to do with himself. Sometimes Min believed one explanation. Sometimes he believed the other. He never did quite manage to make up his mind.

Twenty years passed, and more or less, Min managed to put his hyung into the back of his mind. He never forgot or moved on, but he managed. He lived, or at least he was alive, breathing air, if nothing else. Min had no friends, really, and once, it occurred to him how lonely he was, how lonely he had made himself. At his best he was reticent, reclusive, and not exactly a people-pleaser; at his worst he was downright hostile. But there was nothing he could do about that, just like there was nothing he could do to find his hyung.

So he went on with his life, lonely as it was, and he was _good_ at being a prosecutor. Min couldn't deny he felt pleased with himself when a guilty man was put in prison. It was at those moments that he thought to himself he had become a prosecutor for justice, not for lack of a real purpose. At those moments, Min sometimes caught himself wondering whether or not his hyung would be proud of him. Such thoughts were always immediately disregarded, but left a burning remnant behind that took days to fade back into nonexistence.

Those moments, regardless of the unwelcome thoughts that sometimes accompanied them, were what gave Min the drive, the motivation to keep on with his life. It wasn't a lot, but it was enough to keep him going. Nothing ever quite felt right. Something necessary, something essential, was missing, and nothing could fill the gap only Hyun was meant for. Instead of filling it, he covered it up hastily and marched on determinedly. 

Min's quick-fix, shabby solution suddenly came falling apart when he received an e-mail. Immediately he was curious; it had no subject and came from someone he didn't recognize. When he opened it, it contained a simple, short message.

_Lee Joon-young is dead._

Twenty years of inner conflict came crashing down around Min, leaving him confused and stunned. Lee Joon-young was dead? After twenty years? And why was someone telling him Joon-young was dead, after all those years?

_No,_ was the first thought that came into Min's mind, followed by something that felt like a snake coiling around his chest and tightening, choking the breath out of him. He hadn't moved on, but he'd managed to live without Hyun. He'd convinced himself that after twenty years searching was useless, or at least managed to control the part of him that told him he had to drop everything and look for hyung.

Who else would have sent the message but Hyun? Even as Min tried to urge himself to be rational, think it through, he _knew_ it had to be him. _He was still alive._ Hyun was alive, and Min hadn't looked for him, and if Hyun had e-mailed him that meant he had probably knew it what Min was up to, which meant he knew that Min hadn't looked.

But why hadn't Hyun said anything, then? Why, when he finally sent a message, was it only to tell Min that Lee Joon-young was dead, nothing else? Mind racing, the sound of his heart deafening in his ears (were his eyes wet? Was he crying? Min couldn't remember when he had last cried), he looked back at the e-mail. There was a signature, not just the message, which at first glance looked to be meaningless gibberish. Min knew better than that, though.

Hands shaking, he solved the 'gibberish' quickly, finding it was in reality coordinates. Where to? Lee Joon-young's corpse, or Hyun; maybe Joon-young's corpse _and_ Hyun. Had Hyun... killed Joon-young?

The thought occurred to Min slowly, blearily, but afterwards everything snapped into focus. He blinked away the wetness in his eyes and breathed in deeply. Memorizing the coordinates, he almost ran to his car. For precious seconds he fumbled with the key, but managed to unlock it and start driving. After inputting the coordinates to the GPS, he focused on the feeling of the steering wheel beneath his hands and the robotic voice telling him which way to turn. Everything he'd done over the last twenty years to let him maintain a facade of togetherness was swiftly falling apart, and _did hyung kill him_ was echoing in his mind unanswered though something inside him was screaming _yes, yes, there's no other explanation,_ and if Min didn't focus on those two things to ground himself in reality he didn't know what would happen.

When the GPS' voice cheerily announced that Min had arrived at his destination, it took him a while to register what it had said. He had been gripping onto the steering wheel harder than he realized, and let go slowly, gingerly, looking at his hands like he'd never seen them before. Min exited the car with trepidation.

He found himself in front of what would appear to be a normal house, but the front door was slightly ajar and the lights inside were still on. Frozen, he stared blankly at the inviting, terrifying gap between door and doorframe. From then on, everything moved as if in a dream, a blur he only got a vague impression of afterwards.

Min walked up to the door and opened it just enough for him to go inside, leaving it ajar behind him.

_His father was lying facedown on the floor and there was a pool of dark red around him_

A man was lying on the floor, staring with empty eyes up at the ceiling. The handle of a kitchen knife protruded from his abdomen, liquid red soaking his shirt around it. A pool of blood surrounded him. One of his hands rested on the floor beside him, the other on his stomach, reaching towards the blade embedded in him.

It took a moment for Min to realize he should call the police, and then another one to actually do it. He swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry.

Min strained to get the words out of his mouth. "There's been a murder."

_When day broke, Hyun was gone, and Min's home was a crime scene_

Hyun had killed Lee Joon-young. Min thought he had moved on, but his past had moved with him.


	2. the truth's hard to swallow even when you know you're sick of lies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Min realizes that if you know your brother is the murderer then maybe it's not the best idea to tell the police about the murder. The truth is told, but not necessarily believed. Ji-an and Min are looking for the same person, but for entirely different reasons. Although in a way, they do share one reason. It's weird. I still don't know what I'm doing, sorry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i both have no idea what to make chapter titles but want to make chapter titles. ??? help
> 
> also this one ended up like. way longer than chapter one. i wish i could say i'll try to be consistent with chapter lengths in the future but tbh i'm writing these in the middle of the night on my phone so

Between the time that Min had called the police and the time they actually arrived were a few minutes where Min had nothing to do but think and look at the dead body in front of him. Distantly, it occurred to him that a normal person would have had a more severe reaction to finding a dead body, more along the lines of screaming and running away. When one sees something traumatic in their childhood, then they must not be as affected by it later on. Min had never been bothered excessively if he had to look at a corpse. Though, seeing something similar to a traumatic event could cause flashbacks; so then it must be one or the other, dependent on what kind of child saw what kind of event.

In any case, Min's shock was less because of finding the dead body than because of the fact that it was more likely than not that Hyun, _hyung,_ was responsible. Hyun had murdered the man--not just any man, but Lee Joon-young. 

A mere look at Joon-young's face could not tell you he was a murderer and a kidnapper, and Min wondered for a moment at that. Murderers and criminals walked among normal people and nobody could tell the difference. If he wanted to, Min supposed he could blend in, disappear into the crowd, act just like a 'normal person.' But he had neither a desire nor a need to do so. He was atypical, and he knew it; he had always been unusual, as a child. If things had gone differently, could he have become a murderer, a criminal? Could he have been like Lee Joon-young?

Some traitorous part of his mind added, _like hyung?_ Min stopped that train of thought almost violently, and found that looking at the dead body had suddenly become much more disquieting. Explaining it to himself as wanting to remove himself from the crime scene so when the police arrived he would neither obstruct them or give them more reason for suspicion, Min exited through the door and sat down on the porch steps. 

The night air was pleasantly cool, a soft breeze weaving its way through the streets. In front of Min, streetlights flickered and cars sped past, the rest of the world continuing on as it was wont to do. Everything looked so normal. And in a way, it _was_ normal. People were murdered, people died, the world went on. A tragedy, people would say when they learned someone had died, but in the scheme of things, it was all well and good. Seven billion people in the world and more being born every day, people dying were inconsequential. In the eyes of the universe, 'justice' and 'fairness' were not even concepts, there was only what was, and what was was 'fair' and 'just' enough.

How frustrating, and yet how completely rational and inarguable at the same time. Was it fair that Min had to lose his whole family as a child? It didn't matter. He was just one person. _He_ didn't matter. Was it just for Hyun to kill Lee Joon-young? It didn't matter. He had, and that was what was, and it was unchangeable now and forever. Min's hyung was a murderer.

 _If things had been different,_ Min found himself thinking, and stopped. There was no point to thinking out what-ifs and if-onlys. He had to focus on the present, and where to go from there.

Now that he had the time to think about it, calling the police to notify them about a murder he was more than fairly certain his hyung had committed was not his best idea. He had done it anyway, though, so now he had to figure out what to do next. He couldn't tell them he thought (knew) Hyun had done it. But there was no point in lying about the other things. The dead man was Lee Joon-young, and he had murdered Min's father and kidnapped Hyun twenty years ago. If that gave Min a motive, then the fact that he had called the police and was willing to tell them what he knew would cancel out most suspicion. A double bluff was too needlessly complicated and awkward, more suited for a detective story than real life.

Granted, it would be suspect for him to have received an e-mail telling him Lee Joon-young was dead and giving him the coded coordinates to the body, but there was no way of getting around that. After all, Min had no other reason to have stumbled across the corpse. He had no idea of the identity Joon-young had assumed, so if he lied about being an acquaintance he would be easily seen through. The best lies were based in the truth, after all.

Min had been staring at his feet for the majority of his time waiting outside, and looked up once he heard police cars approaching. Something about the neighborhood he was in struck him as... familiar. Now that he could hear the police coming, he probably didn't have enough time to go check, but he didn't really need to. In his rush to get to the scene and then because of being lost in his thoughts, Min hadn't realized where he was.

Lee Joon-young lived next door to the house he had lived in as a child, the house that was technically still his, actually. They did say that murderers returned to the scene of the crime. Still, it added yet another layer of distaste and sinister eeriness to the whole thing. Min was glad that the police were coming and would most likely take him to the police station to hear what he had to say. He didn't want to stay there for a moment longer than he had to.

*~*~*~*

Cha Ji-an had already not been having the best of days. The suspect they'd been pursuing had been violent, to say the least, and several team members complained as such once he'd finally been cuffed. She was among them.

Later on in the day, Lee Joon-ho's body was discovered, only a few hours at most after he'd been stabbed to death. If they hadn't been friends, they had at least been close acquaintances. For all his sometimes off-putting morbidity he was friendly enough and had a sharp wit. It was the most morbid joke of all, for him to have been murdered.

She went through several emotions when she heard the news: shock, sadness, anger, and finally a steely determination to find the one responsible for his death. Even if her team hadn't been assigned the case, she would have done all she could to help find the culprit. As it was, she was doing everything she could by questioning the person who'd discovered the body: Lee Min, a prosecutor. He was oddly calm, for having found a dead body. Seeing one looking for evidence was an entirely different matter than being the one to find it.

Even before she'd sat down, he asked her a question, the opposite way of how things were supposed to go. "Who was he?" The question sounded earnestly curious.

With a scrutinizing eye, she stared at him, studying his reaction as she asked him, "You didn't know the victim?"

"I only found the body." 

"How did you find the body?"

There was a moment of hesitation before he answered, but it didn't seem to be out of nervousness as much as it was thinking through how to word what he said. "I received an e-mail with the location in code."

His story was at once too unbelievable to be true and too ridiculous to be a lie. Ji-an decided to take it as it was for the moment and soldiered on. "Who sent you this e-mail?"

"I don't know." He didn't seem to be lying, but if he had that little reaction to discovering a corpse it was not out of the question for him to have a good poker face.

It made no sense. Ji-an had to think what he was saying through for a moment before she asked carefully, "why would someone you don't know send you an e-mail with the location of someone you don't know's dead body?"

Once again, a thoughtful pause. The whole time Lee Min looked her straight in the eyes. "The victim's name was Lee Joon-young, and he killed my father and kidnapped my hyung twenty years ago."

The information was so unexpected, so out of nowhere, that for a few seconds Ji-an didn't realize what he was saying. After the meaning settled in, her first reaction was to stare at him, completely incredulous. Was he insane? Another part of her, still in upheaval that Joon-ho had been murdered, wanted to punch him for saying that Lee Joon-ho was a _murderer._ In the end, she settled for asking, "What?"

"I asked you who he was because I have no idea what identity he's assumed," Min explained first, knowing full well what he said was hard to believe. Regardless of whether she believed it at the moment, the e-mail was still sitting in his inbox, and though never proven Lee Joon-young was the main suspect for killing his father and kidnapping Hyun all those years ago. Proving whoever Lee Joon-young pretended to be was actually him was a whole other obstacle. There was little doubt that Joon-young would have been careful so that no one could see through his cover. It was possible Min would be written off as insane. Maybe that was how he reacted to the shock of finding a dead body.

When Ji-an stared at Min in silence, he continued speaking. "The location was not the only thing in the e-mail. Actually, it wasn't even the main message; it was a code in the signature."

This snapped Ji-an back into reality. "What was the main message, then?"

"'Lee Joon-young is dead.'"

"And you still have this e-mail?"

"It should still be in my inbox."

If Lee Min was a liar, then he was an impressive liar, and if he was telling the truth, then Ji-an didn't want to think about that. Only hours after losing a friend, it turned out that friend was a murderer who was responsible for her being the daughter of a criminal? It was unthinkable.

"Do you have anything else you wish to say?"

"I have nothing else to tell you."

"Then..." No questions were left for Ji-an to ask, but she was unsure what to do. "We may call you back for more questions if some evidence turns up."

Min nodded. Internally, he doubted any conclusive evidence would turn up. _Hyung is smarter than that,_ his mind crowed proudly, only to recoil at the thought that Hyun was a murderer, Hyun had killed someone, regardless of who they were. Because that was... wrong. People said it was wrong, and if nothing else it was illegal.

Judging from the officer's reaction, whoever Lee Joon-young had pretended to be, it was not the type of person one would expect to be a murderer. Though no one really ever expected someone to be a murderer. Certainly Min hadn't expected for Hyun to be able to kill someone, even Lee Joon-young.

He hadn't seen Hyun for twenty years, though, and of those twenty years most of them had to have been spent with Lee Joon-young. A child raised by Lee Joon-young... what would they turn out like? What had Hyun become?

"Who was he?" Min tried to ask once again, before he left the police station. "The victim."

Another officer, who appeared to be on the same team as the one who questioned him, responded immediately with "you seemed to know already." He looked to be the sort of person who would be aggravated easily, some degree of annoyance and anger already creeping into his voice.

Min stood his ground. "I want to know who you thought he was."

Yet another officer spoke up, this one less surly. "Lee Joon-ho. He was a medical examiner."

"Ah." So Joon-young ended up involved with dead bodies, even if he wasn't the one responsible for them. "I see. Thank you," Min added hastily on to the end, before finally leaving the station.

As he got into his car, a thought struck him, one that he battled with for a few moments before giving in to. Instead of going home, he went to the place that had once been home, but hadn't been for twenty years. Min tried not to think about the fact Lee Joon-young had been living next door for who knew how long, or why.

Hyun was still alive, and Min had to find him, regardless if he was a murderer. Joon-young had deserved it. Min knew, of course, that murder was against the law and wrong, but he also knew that if anyone deserved murder, Lee Joon-young was among them. Apart from just his father, numerous other people had been killed. If justice didn't matter in the eyes of the universe, Min still believed in it. Hyun had killed Lee Joon-young, but he was still Min's hyung, and he needed to find him.

If finding Hyun meant going back to the house he hadn't touched in twenty years, Min would gladly do it. Now that he knew Hyun was really alive the conflict inside him that he'd kept locked down was quickly becoming a losing battle. Reluctance and doubt was swept away to make room for guilt and determination. 

It took only a short time for Min to find the spare key and unlock the door.

*~*~*~*

The idea was crazy. Insane. Ridiculous, unbelievable, preposterous, impossible. And yet, Ji-an had seen the absolute conviction that Lee Min had said it with--how much he really believed what he was saying was the truth. How could it be the truth, though? How could the man she'd been hunting for for twenty years have been so close, and she missed it? No; he was insane, or at least he had been severely misled. He hadn't even known Joon-ho. Lee Joon-ho was not Lee Joon-young, end of the argument.

He was dead, anyway, so what did it matter? She still needed to find who killed him, whether or not he actually was who Prosecutor Lee said he was. People didn't get to decide whether people could live or die, it just wasn't right. Sure, there were people out in the world who probably did deserve to die. One person, however, didn't get to be judge, jury, and executioner. That wasn't how it worked.

Anyway, it wasn't as if what Prosecutor Lee had said was true, so she needed to stop spending so much time thinking about it. Concentration was key; she needed to focus with everything she had to find anything that could point them to the culprit. Forget the insane things Prosecutor Lee had been spouting. They were unimportant.

Though, it would stand to reason that Lee Joon-young would have enemies, who would be more than willing to kill him. Joon-ho was, perhaps, unusual, but not exactly the enemy-making guy. Criminals who were released from prison would usually go after the people who were more directly involved in their arrest, not the background workers like Joon-ho.

Dammit, the idea just wouldn't get out of her head! Ji-an let out a groan of frustration and put her head in her hands, earning her concerned looks from the rest of the team. She looked up and forced a smile to assure them she was fine, while her brain was working away.

When she'd checked, Lee Joon-young's 'fingerprints' had matched with another criminal's entirely, so that was out of the question to prove anything. Where were his real fingerprints, then? Had they been destroyed? There was nothing else she could think of to prove whether or not Prosecutor Lee could possibly be telling the truth.

Ji-an knew she had to do something, though, or the idea would never stop bothering her. Mentally, she made a note to find out some way to talk to Prosecutor Lee more about what he'd said. She needed to stop thinking about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoa there min u kind of almost ended up thinking about canon there for a second that was close.
> 
> also, i am posting this at 3 am. this is a habit that can't stay school's starting soon i need to get control of my life
> 
> (didn't specify who the other dudes talking to min were really well, but i was thinking myung-woo and team leader kang. honestly, could be anyone. idk. i just really like the awkward police bros.)


	3. nothing can stop me, not even you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Min makes an unpleasant discovery. Ji-an is aware stalking people is not actually a very good way of gaining information, but does it anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have... no idea what chapter titles even are. ??? yeah
> 
> welp this chapter took longer than i intended it to orz and school started today sooo i can make no promises re: when chapters will arrive.
> 
> i do have a better idea what i'm doing and a rough like, outline of a plot outline. more like a plot sketch i guess? not enough to predict how many chapters this'll turn out to be and i... haven't gotten to the ending yet. but never fear! i'll figure it out somehow.
> 
> this chapter is kind of mostly filler tbh. a Thing Happens next chapter though.

Perhaps the most interesting fact about the sight that greeted Min when he opened the door was that, at first, nothing appeared interesting at all. The furniture was covered over in great lengths of drab cloth. Everything was still in its place, not a single item looked to have been touched in twenty years. Disappointment replaced Min's initial apprehension at entering the house.

When he took a second, closer look, though, details incongruous to the house not having been lived in for twenty years popped up. For one, there was not a single speck of dust that Min could find, and overall things were just... oddly clean. In the bathroom he found a half-used bar of soap in the shower that couldn't have been used more than a few days ago.

And finally, the door to the basement was wide open, the stairs descending below eerily dark without the light turned on. Min stared into the darkness, wondering if he would find anything more in its depths, or if nothing would really change when he turned on the light. He didn't know. He was completely in the dark when it came to what kind of person Hyun had become over the past twenty years, besides the fact that he was willing to kill another man. 

Uncertain of what he would find, Min descended the stairs and turned on the light. What he found was... nothing. Not the sort of nothing that was completely useless emptiness devoid of anything possibly helpful. This nothingness was telling.

At the desk, the seat was turned slightly at an angle, like someone had gotten up from it quite suddenly and not bothered to straighten it afterwards. The bed in the corner was unmade, and smaller than Min had ever realized. Apparently the basement had not been taken care of as well as the rest of the house, because a fine layer of dust lingered on some of the surfaces, interrupted by rectangles of cleanliness--books, perhaps?

Whatever had been there had been taken, in any case, and there was only so much Min could conclude from the paltry collection of facts in front of him. Someone had been here, but they had left, and taken everything with them. After inspecting the desk, Min made his way over to the small bed in the corner and sat down upon it, surveying the space hopefully.

No clues. Not a single trace of anything that could lead him to hyung. Min had no idea where he could have gone, how, how he had spent the last twenty years. But he must have been there; who else could it have been?

Which led to the other conclusion: Hyun did not want Min to find him. It was a thought that shook Min’s very foundation, because his whole life had always been centered around one thing, _hyung._ For twenty years he had existed, not lived, because it wasn’t really _living,_ without the person that mattered to him more than anyone or anything else. Now when he finally had the slightest beginning of a clue to find Hyun, to reunite with his hyung--Hyun pushed him away with his silence. The emptiness of the room was oppressive, cloying, breath getting caught in his throat as Min tried to take deep breaths. Beside him, his hands clenched into fists, wrinkling the sheets he sat upon.

Hyun did not want Min to find him.

But then what was Min supposed to do? Forget about his hyung? That was frankly impossible and there was no way Hyun could realistically expect that of him. At once, Hyun was almost within reach but incredibly distant at the same time. He was pushing Min away but Min could not fight against the want, the need for his hyung, not when he was _so close._

He had to look. If Hyun had not left any clues, fine. Min didn't need them. No matter what, he would find him, no question about it. There was no other option that Min could accept choosing; forgetting about Hyun and letting him disappear again would be like cutting his own heart out. 

The only thing Min had to do was find out where to start looking, based on what he knew. Hyun had been taken by Lee Joon-young, whose cover identity was Lee Joon-ho. Maybe--Min was not sure how likely it was, but just maybe--if he looked for the people close to Lee Joon-ho, he could find even the slightest bit of a hint to get him the slightest bit closer to Hyun.

His mind set on that one goal, the tension leaked out of Min's shoulders, hands releasing the sheets, a drawn-out sigh escaping him. He breathed in again and raised his head to look at the stairway, pausing a moment before he stood and walked towards it, then exited the basement. Once he was out, he closed the door behind him. Nothing was in there anyway for him to find.

 _Hyung doesn't want you to find him,_ an unhelpful stray thought pointed out. _Why are you looking? If he really doesn't want you to find him, he can disappear, just like he did all those years ago._

But just as it was impossible for Min to not look for Hyun, it was impossible for him to believe that Hyun really, truly, did not want to be found. Both brothers needed each other, in the end, though Min perhaps was even more dependent. Hyun could not abandon his little brother entirely. Certainly, he could remove any immediately obvious clues as to who he was and where he was, but Min doubted he would have the heart to make it so Min could never find him. At the very least he would stay close enough to keep an eye on his little brother; he had known Min's email, after all.

A flutter of hope, fragile and delicately beautiful as a butterfly newly emerged from its cocoon, started to take flight. Min _could_ find Hyun. More than that, he _would_ find him. _It's been twenty years, hyung. I can't let you leave again that easily._ Resolute in his decision, Min left the house. There was nothing left for him there.

*~*~*~*

Despite their best efforts, the team was unable to find even the slightest piece of anything that could possibly clue them in on who killed Lee Joon-ho, or why. There was only the murder weapon, which was devoid of any fingerprints. Apart from that, there was nothing in the house they could find with any relevance to the case. They hadn’t even hit a dead end; they were just stuck in the middle of nowhere without a road for miles. It was one of the most frustrating things Ji-an had experienced. The murder had raised a million questions and yet there were no answers to be seen.

In all, the entire situation just set her on edge. Joon-ho had been murdered, Prosecutor Lee was claiming that he was actually _Lee Joon-young_ of all people, and she was no closer to getting a conclusion to either mystery. The only thing she had that even had a tenuous resemblance to a clue was Prosecutor Lee’s connection to the case, but there was nothing to definitively tie him to the crime so unless anything turned up they couldn’t bring him back for no reason whatsoever.

Maybe it was for the best that they let things go. Evidently everyone was unsettled by the case and what Prosecutor Lee had said, Eun-bok especially quiet for some reason. If they did find a clue--if they pursued things further--who knew what kinds of things they could uncover if that was only the surface?

And yet.

Ji-an had lacked closure for twenty years, had been looking for something that she could never find for twenty years. A pattern drawn in the sand of a beach washed away ages ago that she was trying to recover by looking at the background of wedding photos shot at the time--and even that was a hunch, uncertain. And even that was unreachable.

And _yet._

For the first time in twenty years, she had the barest semblance of a lead in Prosecutor Lee. In what he had said so confidently as if there was no way it could not be the truth. Who had that kind of blind faith in something they received in an e-mail from someone they didn’t know? What was he hiding? She had to know, she had to find out somehow. At least she had to know if it was a dead end or not.

Inside of Ji-an's brain, there was both a rational part and an irrational, emotional part that was mostly instinct. The rational part told her that stalking someone was, first of all, not necessarily the most effective way of getting information versus, say, actually confronting and talking to a person. Secondly, why did she even think stalking someone was at all a good idea? 

On the other hand, the irrational part told her that it wasn't really 'stalking,' just... observing his movements. And confronting Prosecutor Lee upfront was a stupid idea. Anyways, he was kind of weird and it was kind of really suspicious that he would be notified of a murder and even told its location by someone he 'didn't know.' Why would the murderer tell him specifically? That meant, logically, the murderer probably knew Prosecutor Lee. It was possible that he was lying to protect the actual culprit. But then why call the police to tell them about the murder anyway?

 _See,_ the rational part of her mind told her, _these are all questions you can't answer by stalking Prosecutor Lee but might get an answer to by actually talking to him about it._ To which the irrational part of her said: _no, shut up,_ for lack of a more eloquent way to put it.

In all honesty, stalking-- _observing Prosecutor Lee's movements_ \--didn't actually help Ji-an with anything, though she did learn that he was spectacularly boring and possibly an actual hermit. Yet there was no real suspicious behavior, just the reclusiveness of someone who didn't like socializing a whole much. She couldn't entirely blame him for that.

If he had known who sent the email, he looked very calm about it, though generally his facial expression seemed less of a way to gauge his actual emotions than an impassive mask he changed for the sole purpose of making people feel less uncomfortable around someone so stoic. Perhaps he was only calm on the outside, but in reality was hiding something. Ji-an couldn't tell just from observing his movements.

 _An actual conversation would sure be helpful,_ the rational, sarcastic part of her mind pointed out. Nope. Not an option. She didn't know Prosecutor Lee very well, after all, and he could probably lie straight to her face without her even realizing. Besides, he would no doubt think it suspicious for her to be asking him so many questions outside of her professional capacity as a detective. That was something she did not want to get into.

Unfortunately for Ji-an, she was not as hard to notice as she thought she was, despite her best efforts--or maybe Prosecutor Lee was simply very observant. Either way, he noticed her, and decided to inform her as such one day in a public place she couldn't subtly leave without raising alarm. She'd followed him to a café, one that wasn't excessively crowded but had a smattering of customers, leaving enough tables empty for her to snag one close enough to keep an eye on him but far enough away so she thought he wouldn’t see her. _Thought_ was the key word.

Some time passed, where she tried to watch him while also not seeming too obvious about it (which translated to looking around the café or even at nothing at all, then glancing to him and once again looking away a millisecond later) and he… sat there. Briefly, Ji-an wondered why she was following him around if she gained absolutely nothing by doing so.

Then Prosecutor Lee stood up rather abruptly from his seat and started walking. It was either a testament to his skills or Ji-an’s lack of any that she didn’t realize he was heading towards her until it was too late for her to try and slip away. He sat down across from her with a strained smile that was completely unnecessary and only served to unsettle Ji-an. Before she could open her mouth, he spoke calmly, as if talking about the weather and nothing more. “Why are you following me?” At least he didn’t straight out call it ‘stalking.’

It was a difficult question to answer. While Ji-an struggled to think of something to say that made sense, he started talking instead, mostly to himself. “What are you trying to learn from following me around? Is there something in what I said that bothers you?”

A soft sound of realization--“It’s the e-mail, isn’t it? The contents, and who sent it.”

Still uncertain what to say, Ji-an nodded, hoping he would explain further.

“I don’t know who sent the e-mail, but I think whoever did it is trustworthy.” He paused. “Why would you follow me around just because of the e-mail, though? There’s no real evidence to back it up so why bother? Is it who sent it? Is it the contents?”

“Lee Joon-ho was not Lee Joon-young,” she snapped. It was what Ji-an kept telling herself, what she felt had to be true. She couldn’t just go around doubting someone’s identity without any evidence to support it.

This confident statement seemed to take Prosecutor Lee by surprise. “He was not Lee Joon-young?” Ji-an wondered for a moment why he found that so interesting that he thought it over for a few seconds. “You knew--or knew _of_ \--Lee Joon-young before I ever mentioned him.”

She swallowed. That had been an unintentional slip. “I did my research,” she fumbled to quickly cover up. “Lee Joon-young was a psycho. A murderer. Lee Joon-ho was not.”

Prosecutor Lee smiled, but it was cold, threatening, unsettling. “Twenty years ago, what could he have done that involved you?”

“Nothing.”

“Were you close to one of his victims?” Ji-an struggled to keep her expression under control and stop him from figuring anything else out. “One of your parents. Both of them?”

“No.” The denial came out sharper than she intended (or maybe it didn’t, he was being unnerving and she wanted him to stop). “It’s none of your business.”

His silence felt like a concession of sorts. “Stop following me.” So it was a white flag--if she stopped investigating him he wouldn’t investigate her. For a moment Ji-an thought it over. _His father was killed by Lee Joon-young. You can tell him…_ But her father had been the prison guard when Lee Joon-young had broken out, the day his father had died. And she didn’t know exactly what kind of connection Prosecutor Lee had to the murderer, the victim, or to Lee Joon-young.

The smile on his face was wrong somehow, and Ji-an made her decision. She stood up from her seat with a curt nod and left him sitting alone at the table.

Min watched her as she left curiously, trying to riddle out anything more about what she was trying to accomplish. She had something against Lee Joon-young, something personal. Part of him wanted to figure it out; but finding hyung was more important. And besides, she was almost certainly going to be his enemy if he wanted to find Hyun.

In another life, perhaps they could have been allies--of a sort. But as it was, Hyun was all he wanted, all he needed. The detective was unimportant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> funny you should say that min :3c
> 
> B3c
> 
> (tbh I'm not 100% happy w this chapter but uhrhfh)


	4. big things can come from small beginnings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Min loses a case and meets an interesting person. Ji-an comes to a decision. Confronting people and actually talking to them, you see, is a better method of getting information than stalking people. In certain cases.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am posting this at 12 am and i am sorry to myself. rip. chapter titles are still wrecks.
> 
> school + my general mental health are kind of wreaking havoc on my motivation rn, so i just. *lies down* schooool whyyyy
> 
> i shall do my best to get chapters out asap
> 
> meet A New Person, he may or may not be plot important in the future.

As the days passed, Min was pleased to find that the detective was no longer following him around everywhere he went. Well, either that, or she had significantly improved at blending in and looking inconspicuous. He was more than fairly certain that it was the first case, though. 

On a less positive note, he couldn't find anything conclusive when it came to a connection between Lee Joon-ho and, well, anyone. He was friendly, it seemed, but distant from most people. A careful balance between getting dangerously close and being suspiciously closed off. Maybe if Min had had a specific person to search for, he would have had some better results. As it was, he was left with far too many unsubstantiated possibilities but nothing more.

Then, he lost a case.

Prior to that day, things had looked at least slightly to be leaning in his favor, and he suspected the defense had largely been stalling for time, waiting for something. It had looked like Park So-min's claims that she had killed Song Taehwan in self defense were at best a flawed perception of events when she was really not in mortal danger. At worst, they were an outright fabrication.  
Certainly it could be determined that So-min and Taehwan's relationship had ended on less than friendly terms, and that Taehwan was an aggressive and violent person potentially capable of killing someone. Certainly she had not premeditated killing him. But there was nothing to show that she had retaliated appropriately--that she had killed Taehwan only because he would have killed her.

The odd thing about her testimony was that she attested firmly that Taehwan had had a weapon--a knife, to be exact. She said she had no idea where it had gone in the fight. It was true she had some scratches on her arms, but they could have been caused by any number of things. Besides, no knife had been found.

Until the knife was found.

Min had to admit that he was completely taken aback when it was revealed the knife was in fact hidden inside a pen so skillfully as to make it practically indistinguishable from a real pen unless one knew how to look. Song Taehwan had been a collector of eclectic objects, that he knew, though he thought it had had little relevance. Apart from the fact that So-min had grabbed a small, unusual metal figurine that Taehwan owned to hit him over with the head with, that is. But Min had not expected him to have what amounted to a switchblade disguised as a pen.

The figurine had had scratches on it, and as it turned out, there were lingering traces of the metal on the blade--as well as tiny flakes of So-min's blood. So-min had explained she knew, to a degree, how to fight, and that was how she had managed to avoid any severe injury, combined with her using the figurine for blocking Taehwan's more potentially dangerous blows; it looked as if she had spoken the truth.

Once things were concluded (it was agreed that Park So-min had only acted in self-defense to protect her own life), Min was still... baffled at how the situation had come about. How had somebody managed to figure out that what looked entirely like an unassuming, normal pen was not in the slightest?

The answer came in the form of someone he noticed lingering, watching So-min cheer with her younger sister before trying to slip away surreptitiously. Other people didn't notice the man at all; Min, however, was much more observant than most people. He communicated relief at seeing the sisters so happy, which could mean several things, and also some kind of pride at the sight. As he didn't look to be related to either of them--neither acknowledged him at all--this, combined with several other conclusions, led Min to the final answer: he must have been the one to find the knife.

Before the man could slink away, Min walked quickly to catch up with him and smiled as friendly and unassuming as he could manage. If he was correct (and typically, he was), then--

"Excuse me," Min began, with a voice that was practiced hesitance and amiability. The man turned around slowly to face him. "Are you the one who found the knife?"

He could feel the man searching his face, surveying him carefully for something. "...yes," the man said hesitantly, then appeared to come to some sort of conclusion. "Cho Dongchul," he introduced himself. "You're the prosecutor." At the end he smiled. It stood to reason he would be less than excited to be confronted by the prosecutor who had just lost a case because of him.

Min nodded. "I'm not interested in yelling at you, if that's what you're so nervous about." Dongchul froze before his tenseness started to dissipate just a little bit. "I was just wondering how you discovered the weapon."

"It's not that interesting," Dongchul replied dismissively.

"I am interested."

Once again Dongchul studied him. "It was simple. I just used the evidence I already had." As he started speaking, his words were slow and soft, but Min noticed as he continued he became more animated and spoke smoothly. "Park So-min is relatively intelligent, enough to know that if there is no weapon her testimony will sound ridiculous. The cuts could have been inflicted by many different things, and are not deep enough to prove anything.

"Either she is trying to pull off a complicated kind of double bluff, which is unlikely; first of all, it does not suit her. She is a very direct kind of person who wouldn’t be interested in doing something like that. Second, it is unlikely to work and not worth the waste of time. "

Before he continued, Dongchul paused for a moment to raise another point. "However, what other explanation is there for her fingerprints all over the murder weapon? It is better to say it was in self defense than pointlessly try to defend herself. But if so, why was she so insistent and detailed in her description of the knife he pulled on her? It has to be determined, definitively, whether or not the knife exists."

"What if it didn't exist?" Min prodded when Dongchul paused for air. "Why did you spend effort looking for something that might not even exist? Park So-min could have been a cold-blooded killer."

To that, Dongchul had no quick reply. In his body language Min could see he was thinking out how to respond. When he did, he spoke carefully, like he was testing the waters. "She could have been a cold-blooded killer, or she could have been someone acting in self defense, out of fear for her own life. People don't deserve to be sentenced for crimes they didn't commit."

Min didn't give up so easily. He pointed out, "You didn't know she would be sentenced for murder when it was in reality self-defense."

"I didn't want to take that chance." Dongchul tensed momentarily. Then, Min noticed, he averted his eyes before he sighed, shoulders sagging. "People who murder others in cold blood deserve to be punished, but people who only acted out of self-defense are justified in their actions."

"I see." The response was as noncommittal as could be, and Dongchul once again seemed to be studying Min, looking for... something. "How did you find the knife, in the end?"

Now that they were off the more difficult subject, Dongchul once again spoke with an enthusiasm for getting to the bottom of a case. "Nobody had touched the crime scene since Park So-min had left it, so if the knife existed it still had to be there. If Song Taehwan had been wielding it shortly before his death, then it ought to be somewhere near the body. The pen, I noticed, was not very far from his hand. And his hand was in a position like he had been holding a knife. So, I studied the pen, and discovered that on its side was a switch, easily missed at first glance. If you flick up--" Dongchul demonstrated with one hand as he spoke-- "a blade comes out. It also retracts if you pull down to be quickly concealed, which Song Taehwan had evidently done before he died."

He stopped at the end of that sentence with a look that said he still had something more to say. At length, he added, with a touch of disappointment, "It was... really quite simple. After that it was found that Park So-min's blood and the same material at the status were on the blade, and after that her testimony made much more sense." Dongchul shrugged. "I simply did my job."

"I see," Min found himself repeating, then "thank you for your time. It was a pleasure meeting you, Detective Cho."

"And you as well. Though, Prosecutor Lee, I'm a consultant, technically, not an official detective for the police." 

"Really?"

"It gives me a little more freedom, I suppose, even if the fee is not all that impressive." Dongchul smiled. "If that's all, then..."

"Wait." Immediately, Dongchul froze. "Have you ever heard of a Lee Joon-ho?"

"You mean the medical examiner?" Min nodded, and Dongchul shook his head 'no' with an apologetic shrug. "I heard about the murder, but I didn't know him very well. Why do you ask?"

"There's no particular reason, don't worry," Min hastily assured him. Dongchul didn't seem to completely believe what he said, but didn't ask any questions and simply left after a quick exchange of 'goodbye's. As the consultant walked away he seemed to relax slightly, like he was relieved to be away from Min. Most likely, it was just that Min made him nervous, especially considering that Min had just lost a case because of him.

Cho Dongchul was... interesting. Intelligent, certainly, with an energy for solving cases and a determination to prove the innocent innocent and the guilty guilty. He had obviously fully believed in what he said, and yet averting his eyes had indicated... something. What, exactly, Min didn't know. Anyways, Min doubted he'd see much more of the man, so he simply decided to file him away as a consultant for the police who was good at his job.

A consultant for the police.

Surely it would be too much of a coincidence for Cho Dongchul to be asked to help with the Lee Joon-ho case. He hadn't been asked yet, evidently; it was possible he was a consultant for a specific investigative team and so would not be involved at all. In any case, Min was fairly certain that even if Dongchul was asked to help, he would not be able to solve the case. His hyung had made sure he would not get caught.

The police looking for Hyun was not at the forefront of Min's mind, but rather an afterthought, a detail to possibly take into consideration. He was much more preoccupied with _him_ finding his hyung.

*~*~*~*

Technically speaking, Ji-an was not stalking Prosecutor Lee anymore. Now she was observing his movements, from a distance. It was not, she found, any more or any less productive than following him around had been, which spoke for the unproductivity of following him around. She contemplated the possibility that he really had nothing more to tell her, that he really did not know who had sent the e-mail.

No mattet how hard Ji-an tried, it didn't quite fit in her head right, the sort of thing that she could pretend she believed but would never truly have faith in. He had to know something, and she had to figure out what it was, but how? Ji-an had no bargaining chip to use against him. Without any reason for him to tell her anything, he wouldn't tell her anything.

Maybe, Ji-an mused, Prosecutor Lee would understand if she told him the truth about why she was so fixated on his saying Joon-ho was Lee Joon-young. He'd been turning around her questions back on her. If she answered him, would he offer anything to her?

It was not guaranteed to work by any means, but she didn't know what else to do. They had nothing to go on with the case, nothing that indicated who killed Lee Joon-ho or why. The others had seemed to mostly file away Prosecutor Lee's claim that he was Lee Joon-young as unlikely at best, since there was no evidence to support the idea and Prosecutor Lee had said himself he didn't know the victim. Nonetheless, it made them all uncomfortable and uncertain as time dragged on and they could not riddle out anything they needed to even start looking for the murderer. Eunbok and Ji-an, it seemed, were the ones especially unsettled.

Ji-an rested her chin in her hand and let out a little frustrated groan. Myungwoo looked up at her with an expression that conveyed the same feeling. 

Prosecutor Lee had just lost a case in a surprising turn of events, where the evidence needed to prove the defendant had acted in self-defense had suddenly appeared out of seemingly nowhere. _If only that could happen with this case,_ Ji-an thought bitterly to herself. She raised her head a little bit to see how the others were faring. Since they had absolutely nothing to go on and were quickly losing motivation to keep on searching for something that just kept eluding their grasp, the team had become listless.

After a few minutes of thinking about it, Ji-an decided that she would go to Prosecutor Lee and tell him the truth. If she was lucky, he might offer her something, anything, that could help with the case. If she wasn't, well, she didn't really have anything to lose. Her father... she supposed it was a secret, but it wasn't the sort of secret she kept secret about because she was ashamed and didn't want anyone to know. Well, kind of, it was, but really it was just because it was the sort of thing somebody didn't talk about.

Mind made up, Ji-an set out to find Prosecutor Lee.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> originally Another Thing was going to happen in this chapter, but then Min's conversation with Dongchul took longer than initially expected, so.
> 
> next chapter: Ji-an and Min have a conversation bordering on cordial. It's a frickin Christmas miracle
> 
> honestly i just reaaaaally want to get to the part when hyun actually shows up proper because *throws confetti* those are the fun times. by which i mean absolutely terrible times.


	5. from an unexpected source

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ji-an and Min have a conversation; she tells the truth, and he offers advice that she actually considers.

"You wanted to apologize for stalking me?" For a moment, Ji-an thoroughly enjoyed the fact that she had completely blindsided Prosecutor Lee with that statement. Whatever he'd been expecting, it wasn't that. He looked at her like he was inspecting her for any sign she wasn't telling the truth.

Ji-an couldn’t help but wince slightly as he described her behavior as 'stalking.' Maybe it was true, but she still didn't like being described that way. Though she supposed he didn’t like getting stalked, so really it was only fair. ‘Correcting’ him would just waste time and generally be irritating, so she got straight to the point: “yes... and one other thing.”

Prosecutor Lee might as well have said 'I knew it' with his amused expression, recovering swiftly from his earlier surprise. Ji-an decided it best to ignore him and keep on talking before he could make any smart remarks. "You asked me what my connection to Lee Joon-young was."

"I thought you said there wasn't one." It seemed that Prosecutor Lee had an innate ability to gain control of a conversation. Somehow he just managed to choose his words and make it so he was the one leading it, not her.

Reluctantly, Ji-an admitted, "I was lying." Before he could speak, she continued on, explaining, "It was none of your business."

"But it is now?"

If she didn't let him get a rise out of her, Ji-an figured that she could remain on top. Though, ignoring him would probably aggravate Prosecutor Lee, which might not be a good thing. Ji-an just couldn’t win, could she? At least she had to try and get the information she needed. She sighed, clearing her head of the confusing thoughts, and told him plainly, "I need to know everything you know about that e-mail, about the murder."

His expression was unreadable, smug amusement replaced with something closed down and guarded. It was almost disturbing how quickly the change took place, how his demeanor changed entirely. The way Prosecutor Lee spoke was calm, cold, his words carefully chosen. "I already told you everything I know."

Knowing he had to be hiding something, Ji-an didn't believe him for a second. She stared straight into his eyes and said defiantly, “I told you I had no connection to Lee Joon-young. We both weren't telling the truth.”

“That is a rather bold statement.” Prosecutor Lee leaned back slightly in his chair, his gaze steady, confident he had the upper hand. “You don’t have anything to back it up with.” 

“I _know,_ ” Ji-an insisted, ignoring how weak her insistence was. “You know something about the e-mail, about who sent it. We _need_ to know that information.” She clenched her jaw, trying to think of anything more to say. “A man was murdered. We have to find his killer. If you have information, you need to tell it to us.”

“If, hypothetically speaking, I did have information, why should I give it to you? If I knew information and I kept it from the police, then I must have a good reason for it. What do you have that could matter more than that?” The question was rhetorical, really; they both knew she had nothing.

He was just waiting for her response, anticipating whatever she could think up so he could dismantle it. Prosecutor Lee seemed to think of every conversation as a tool, or some kind of puzzle to solve to get what he wanted. It was unnerving, how analytical and cold he acted when he had no need to maintain false politeness. Ji-an could have imagined him as being a murderer, given a motive. Though she supposed everyone was like that; just with some people it wasn’t immediately obvious.

She didn’t really have anything that could convince him to talk, and he knew that. “Lee Joon-young,” she said suddenly, almost surprising herself. It was too late to back down, though; Prosecutor Lee looked curious, waiting for her to expand upon whatever she wanted to say. “My father was a prison guard. When Lee Joon-young escaped twenty years ago, he went missing.” Prosecutor Lee knew enough to put two and two together and figure out that her father would have been implicated as an accomplice. Something changed in the way he held himself, though she wasn’t sure what or how, but she almost flinched.

_The victim's name was Lee Joon-young, and he killed my father and kidnapped my hyung twenty years ago. _Prosecutor Lee’s matter-of-fact statement replayed in Ji-an’s mind and things started to click together just a little too well to be comfortable. She had heard about it, hadn’t she, all that time ago? Yet she’d never thought about it. She had never met the kid left behind, had never thought of it as something real, something that she should be concerned about. Her father’s disappearance and his implication as a criminal was a punch in the gut. Ji-an had been a child then, she hadn’t cared about things that didn’t directly affect her. The kid left behind was an afterthought, if even that.__

__Now, the ‘kid left behind’ was sitting in front of her, and Ji-an wondered if what had happened twenty years ago--was that why he felt aloof, distant… inhuman? What sort of person would you become, if you had your whole family taken from you at such a young age? If you were the one left behind?_ _

__As she came to this unpleasant realization, Ji-an also noticed that there had been dead quiet between them. Prosecutor Lee had been carefully thinking over how to reply, while she had been absorbed in her thoughts._ _

__Finally, the only thing he said was, “I see.” There was another pause; Ji-an felt like he was waiting for her to say something, and so purposefully did not, letting the quiet drag on. The background noise, the movement and conversations of the people around them, suddenly felt oppressive, too much. She fidgeted slightly in her seat._ _

__Prosecutor Lee was making sense of things, now that he knew that piece of information, starting to understand more. “So,” he began, “you did not want to believe someone you thought you knew was the person responsible for making your father a criminal.”_ _

__“My father wasn’t a criminal,” Ji-an found herself snapping before she could even think about it, jaw clenching in frustration. Like twenty years ago, insisting pointlessly over and over again, _my father would never do that, my father is a good person, my father is not a criminal. I am not a criminal’s daughter._ She would never get rid of that, would she? And Prosecutor Lee, he would never be able to be the person he would’ve become if he hadn’t had his family taken from him._ _

__“Of course not,” Prosecutor Lee replied smoothly, then looked up at her with some kind of disappointment. Had he expected her to pull out some miraculous thing to change his mind and tell her what he knew? “Was that supposed to convince me to tell you what you think I know?”_ _

__The answer to that was ‘no,’ of course. Just from the way Ji-an looked down at her feet, anyone could tell. Once again, she changed the subject so she wasn’t a sitting duck for his analyzing. “No,” she admitted, “I don’t have anything better than your reason, whatever it is.” She sighed and looked up at Prosecutor Lee resignedly. He stared evenly back, maintaining eye contact until finally Ji-an turned her gaze away. Prosecutor Lee had information, she knew it, and he knew that she knew. But there was no way to get it out of him, and so no way to progress further with the case._ _

__When Ji-an stood up to leave, frowning in disappointment, he took her by surprise by saying something. “It might be useful to ask for outside help,” he suggested. His voice was even, no sign of a lie or the suggestion being some kind of joke._ _

__Stunned, Ji-an froze and took a moment to realize he had actually said something that wasn't either disparaging or analytical. “Outside help?” She studied his face for some sign of deceit; why was he saying this out of nowhere? “Like a consultant?”_ _

__Prosecutor Lee nodded silently, offering nothing further. Was he smiling? "Why are you telling me this?" Ji-an questioned, struggling to decipher what motive he had for offering that advice._ _

__"If a consultant manages to find some evidence that you missed, then you'll stop bothering me, won't you?" he answered dismissively. "Either way, it's up to you."_ _

__Surely he had to be playing at something. There was no way he was just... telling Ji-an to do something useful, it didn't make sense. Why was he saying that? What was he trying to achieve?_ _

__Instead of dwelling on it any longer, Ji-an decided to leave and think about it later. "I will keep that in mind, then. Thank you." With a curt nod, Ji-an hurried out. She could wonder about Prosecutor Lee's motivations at another time. His advice... was quite possibly worth taking. Maybe a consultant, someone with a different perspective, would be able to pick up on something the team had not. She would try to mention it to Team Leader later on. For now, she just wanted to leave.__

 _ _*~*~*~*__

 _ _The tension in the air was very nearly palpable. Everyone in the team was at least an acquaintance of Lee Joon-ho's, and it was disturbing that he would be murdered so suddenly. It was disturbing that he was killed so _well._ The only thing approaching a lead was the e-mail that had been sent to Prosecutor Lee. After attempting to trace it back to the source they discovered that the e-mail address it had been sent from was used once, in a library, when a mass of students had been studying there, which was not very useful at all. Unless Prosecutor Lee was hiding something, the killer had left not a trace of evidence to point to their identity._ _

__"There has to be something," Seungjoo insisted, but even he was becoming disheartened after days of fruitless searching. Anything and everything had been examined once, twice, three times, but nothing led anywhere. Neighbors reported hearing raised voices but no one had seen anyone entering or exiting the house. Lee Joon-ho, as far as they could tell, had no enemies that would be willing to murder him._ _

__To put it simply, the team was at a loss. No one was willing to give up, but no one had any idea what to do that might help them. An uneasy silence had settled over everyone; Cha Ji-an was quite noticeably absent._ _

__At the thought of Cha Ji-an, Team Leader Kang was reminded of something else. "Who was that person Prosecutor Lee said Lee Joon-ho was?" It was a similar name, he remembered... "Lee Joon-young?"_ _

__Everyone turned to face him expectantly. "Who was he?" Eunhyuk asked, hoping that maybe that would at least give them hope for a lead._ _

__"Lee Joon-young was a murderer," Eunbok replied, eyes fixed on his computer's screen. "Twenty years ago he escaped from prison and... he hasn't been seen since." His eyes flickered downward for a moment, an action so swift that no one registered it even happened._ _

__Taken aback, Myungwoo blinked at Eunbok. "How did you know that?"_ _

__"I did my research," Eunbok answered dismissively, continuing on to say, "I don't think it's very likely that what Prosecutor Lee said was true. Why would someone who escaped from prison become a medical examiner, where they know they'd be working for the police?"_ _

__"But, Lee Joon-ho wasn’t... a murderer," Seungjoo insisted. “We know that already.” None of them, it is true, wanted to doubt Lee Joon-ho. He had just been murdered, after all, and he had worked with them on several different occasions. Thinking about it too much gave Eunhyuk an uncomfortable feeling._ _

__"It's the only idea we have," Eunhyuk pointed out, then paused. Now that they were on the subject, more thoughts and observations were coming to mind. "What Prosecutor Lee said... why did it bother Cha Ji-an so much? She's been fixated on what he said, I noticed."_ _

__"He said Lee Joon-ho was a murderer," Myungwoo stated bluntly, and with more than a little derisiveness. "Out of all of us, Cha Ji-an probably knew him the best. I would be bothered if someone told me that someone I knew who had just died was a murderer."_ _

__"I guess you're right," Eunhyuk conceded, but the idea continued to nag at him for some reason. "Still... someone like Lee Joon-young would have enemies, probably. As far as we know Lee Joon-ho had none that wanted to kill him." He shrugged with a sigh, knowing what he was saying was ridiculous. "We need to try anything we can to figure out this case."_ _

__Myungwoo looked at him like he was trying to judge whether Eunhyuk was serious or not. "If Lee Joon-ho was--a criminal of any kind, he wouldn't be a medical examiner. We have a fingerprint database for a reason."_ _

__For some reason, that had not occurred to Eunhyuk. "Oh," he muttered lamely, feeling sheepish. So what Prosecutor Lee had been saying couldn't be true, or at least was highly unlikely. Someone on the inside would have had to tamper with the fingerprints, and Eunhyuk wanted to believe that would not happen. Of course, there was always corruption inside practically any organization. Desperately, Eunhyuk hoped that in this incident, it had not reared its ugly head again._ _

__"Where is she anyway?" Seungjoo smoothly changed the topic. No one knew; it was not like they kept tabs on the others' whereabouts at all times._ _

__Myungwoo shrugged, then grumbled, "She had a good idea getting away from here. We're getting nothing done." Frustrated, he stared up at the ceiling and gritted his teeth. "We have nothing. No ideas, no evidence. Nothing."_ _

__Sympathetic, Eunhyuk walked over to Myungwoo's side and awkwardly tried to assure him, "There has to be something.” Every time he insisted it, it sounded even less likely. Myungwoo didn’t bother to respond._ _

__Everyone immediately straightened up as Cha Ji-an walked in, an unreadable expression on her face. “Where were you?” Myungwoo immediately asked._ _

__“With a friend,” she answered quickly, sitting down in a practically instinctive reaction before a thought struck her. “Have you come up with anything while I was gone?”_ _

__“Guess,” Myungwoo muttered. Ji-an rested her chin in one hand, the fingers of her other hand drumming against her desk. “What about you?”_ _

__She turned to face Eunhyuk, thoughtful. After taking a moment to think it over, she breathed in and asked, hesitantly, “Have you considered… a consultant?”_ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaaAH H oh my god im so sorry i went over a month without anything ;A; i would promise never again but idk if i can really say that orz
> 
> im not entirely happy with this chapter but gdi its been long enough
> 
> this chapter finally getting posted is thanks to my friend warning me about fanfic jail. this chapter taking so long to get posted is thanks to the combined forces of my mental health + school. good news: i am now on antidepressants. bad news: other things are providing NEW STRESS so that's fun
> 
> aNYWAY TAKE A WILD GUESS AS TO WHO IS GOING TO MEET WHO NEXT CHAPTER


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